


Scholarly Pursuits

by Andrina_Nightshade



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: (Un)happily ever after, Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Vampire, Blood, Blood and Gore, Cunnilingus, Dark fic, F/M, Flirting, Gratuitous blood drinking, Implied Rey/Kaydel, Libraries, Masturbation, Non-Consensual Blood Drinking, Obsessive Behavior, Oral Sex, Rose is an awesome friend, Safe to Read if Triggered by Pregnancy, Shameless Smut, Vampires, bisexual rey, safe sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-01
Updated: 2020-10-08
Packaged: 2021-03-08 01:34:43
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 10,997
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26757349
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Andrina_Nightshade/pseuds/Andrina_Nightshade
Summary: "In the gloom of the library, at some ungodly hour when only demons and insomniacs frequent, Rey first caught the scent of him."Ben Solo spends the midnight hours in the University Library, ignorant of the dark maiden who hungers after him...Written for #Reyloween2020. Prompts: "Vampires" and "Dark Academia"
Relationships: Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 13
Kudos: 65
Collections: Reyloween 2020





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Written as a two-shot for #Reyloween2020. Prompts: Vampire (1st October) and dark academia (8th October). A very, very loose adaptation of "The Historian," by Elizabeth Kostova
> 
> Mind the tags!

In the gloom of the library, at some ungodly hour when only demons and insomniacs frequent, Rey first caught the scent of him. At first, it was little more than a tantalising whisper, buried beneath the smell of dust, aged leather and vellum.

But it had piqued her interest, and so she followed it, slipping into the shadows. Past endless rows of shelves and scattered inhabitants she walked, the aroma growing ever more powerful.

She found him in the farest corner, huddled over a single desk, the watchful eyes of some long deceased professor looking disdainfully upon him. So engrossed in his work, Rey did not even have to use a glamour to disguise herself from his sight.

She closed her eyes, listened to the cadence of his heartbeat. Her tongue, still wet with the taste of her last meal, flicked over her lips. The scent of his blood filled her nostrils until she could smell naught else. So rich, heady… ah, what a fine meal he would make.

A pity, then, that she had drunk her fill on a professor not an hour earlier. There had been such blood in the old man that it would sustain her for days.

But this man before her… This was not to be some tawdry snack to be wasted on a whim. He would be a feast to be savoured, every drop lapped up in an ecstasy of taste and pleasure.

His heartbeat quicked. A frustrated groan tumbled from his lips, echoing in the stillness. As soon as he realised how loud it had been, his cheeks (and even the tips of his ears) flooded with heat.

Rey’s fangs only grew at the sight. How utterly horrid of him to tear her so, with his face so full of delicious blood that she could not yet imbibe upon.

Her doubly-late, much despised Maker, had certainly been a great proponent of playing with his victims ere he devoured them. (Though Snoke had despised the very act of actually hunting for them - “too coarse, too feral” - and had utilized Rey as his drudgeon to lure and capture them instead for much of their association). He would loudly extoll the vicious delights of letting his prey’s terror and madness build to a crescendo before he consumed them. 

_“How much more decadent the eventual meal!”_ His honeyed tones purred in her memory.

Grudgingly, Rey had supposed there was some truth to the sentiment. 

Blood was far more than mere iron and plasma; to the discerning of her kind (and perhaps, in her age she was becoming as such), it was a cocktail of experience and emotion, all that made a human being. Pains and pleasures, guilt and exhilaration… one could taste it all in every drop.

A vampire _could_ perhaps live on animal blood alone - the nutrients were little different - but, ah, what a miserable existence to be denied the full sensory experience of exsanguinating and consuming a human.

And this man here… his blood was evidently of the finest vintage.

So, in shadows she stood and drank him in. Estimating human ages had never been her forte even when she was still human herself, but she guessed him to be around thirty. A postgraduate student perhaps, or even a youthful academic - not some flighty, silly little undergraduate. There was something proud, almost aristocratic, in his features - she imagined a look of haughty disdain in those eyes and upon those plush lips. He wore thick-rimmed spectacles which perpetually seemed to slip down his nose. His hair was dark as midnight, a sharp contrast to the pale skin which glistened like marble in the moonlight. Moles dotted his face, and Rey wondered where else upon his body she might find them.

Between long fingers, he twirled a fountain pen. Even from afar, she saw ink smudges upon his hand. How curiously antiquated a tool in this time of laptops and other devices… This was a man who belonged in another century or era.

Half-unconsciously, she began to drift closer (though at least she retained the wherewithal to glamour herself from his sight), until she hovered over him as a spectre. So very close… enough to flick her tongue over his pulsepoint and run her nails over his neck…

 _No_ , she chided herself. _Not tonight…_

As she moved closer, the man shivered, and huddled deeper into his cable knit jumper. His hands reached for the tweed blazer over his chair, before shrugging and returning to his work.

Bemusement filled her features when she saw his choice of reading material; a surprisingly modern printing of Colerigde, laid open over the poem _‘Christabel’_. 

A scholar of literature, she decided, and her eyes hungrily roved over the remainder of his desk. A pile of books stood proud at the side - all much older and finer volumes of leather, whose ancient scent seemed to permeate wisdom and knowledge.

But then her eyes fell upon one of them, the name “ _Palpatine_ ” emblazoned in gold upon its spne.

And Rey’s smile turned even crueler.

Of course, she recognised the name. Sheev Palpatine had achieved a level of notoriety among the mortals, such that endless bastardizations of his tale had been made into penny dreadfuls and tawdry horror movies since the dawn of cinema. A cheap and less interesting version of Dracula.

But whilst Vlad Tepes was merely an infamously cruel man, with nary a hint of the supernatural about him… Palpatine's legends were rooted in truth. 

And arguably, he was also her vampiric grandfather. As Snoke had sired her, so too had Sheev Palpatine sired him many centuries before. She had never known Palpatine - the beast was long dead centuries before her birth and rebirth as a creature of the night - but Snoke had clung to the name of Palpatine as some mark of honour.

At least, until mortals developed a fascination with Palpatine’s tale - though it had none of the romance of Stoker’s _Dracula_ , his monstrosity and wanton cruelty clearly appealed to the species darkest nature. (And maybe there was also something satisfying about slaughtering a monster in both pages and film prints.)

Perhaps, Rey mused, that was what had driven Snoke to his final and fatal obsession. Or perhaps it was having to seek his own prey, without Rey to take care of the more disdainful aspects… 

Snoke was then, and always had been too full of his own self-importance and overly fond of theatrics. Hunting for his prey was beneath him. Instead, he would lay clues to a tantalising mystery - the location of Palpatine’s ancient library, full of books long forgotten by history, to lure scholars and adventurers and fortune seekers to him. To his credit, it had worked (for a time), until one over-eager academic had plunged a stake into his heart.

The mode of Snoke's final death was a source of bemusement and gossip amongst the others of her kind. “Oh, all of us eventually go a bit do-lally in our old age,” Rose had said one night as she and Rey sat over the rooftops and gazed down on the city. “Wonder what my weird obsession will be?” And they had chatted for hours, until an adequate meal presented itself.

All musings were then lost in an orgy of terror and blood. 

It had been a _very_ good night…

Rey shook her head. Snoke would not occupy more of her thoughts, at least not in the presence of this delicious morsel.

So she continued to devour him with eyes and nose alone.

Her gaze fell upon a plastic ID card, slightly worn and emblazoned with Coruscant University’s crest upon it. The photo was a decent one, sans glasses but with a thin-lipped smile upon his lips, and the name “Ben Solo” stamped beneath it.

A dark chuckle escaped Rey, too low for him to hear. Ben Solo… A fitting moniker for one who lingered in the darkest recesses of a library at midnight.

For how long she watched him, Rey could not recollect. He began to yawn, which she took as her cue to retreat. From the corner, she watched him slip his books into a leather satchel, and scurry off into the night.

But Rey knew with absolute certainty that he would be back tomorrow. 

* * *

In the eerie stillness of her home, Rey thought about Ben Solo. About how sumptuous his blood had smelled; how rich and delectable he would taste. Even satiated as she was, pangs of hunger snapped at her. He burned in her blood as a fever.

Perhaps, she mused on the edge of sleep, she might seduce him before the kill? Fuck him, taste his every flavour before exsangiating him to feed her hunger?

It was not her usual means of procuring a meal. A quick hunt, followed by rapid devouring was much more suited to Rey. Carnal pleasures were all fine and well (and she had never deprived herself of a bedmate if she felt the urge) but she found relations with humans to be too tame. Bedding another vampire was infinitely preferably - much more use of teeth and nails, and significantly improved stamina too. Human passion was tepid in comparison. 

But still… perhaps Ben Solo would be different?

Before long, her thighs grew slick with wanting. No human had ever done that for her...

So Rey peeled off her gown, feeling the silk cling to sweat-slicked flesh. One hand sought and circled that hidden nub of pleasure, whilst the nails of her other tugged and pulled at her nipples, hard enough to bruise. 

She imagined his huge, warm hands in the place of her own, teasing her breasts and roughly fucking her with his fingers. Perhaps, she thought with an erotic thrill, that those hands would still be stained with ink from his studies?

Would he run his tongue over her cunt, bite the soft skin of her thighs as he fucked her with his mouth? Would his moans and sighs reverberate through her body as he worshipped her?

And she… she would tug on his hair to pull him closer at the precipice of her climax… and then would roll atop him and fuck him until he too broke. Sharp nails and sharper teeth would mark him as hers, and only hers…

And then she would devour him whole.

His name fell into the darkness as she shattered under her own touch.

But the hunger for him still did not abate.

* * *

After dusk, with an autumn wind caressing the loose hairs at her nape, Rey returned to the library.

Gaining entry again was easy enough. A simple glamour and a tearful story to the attendant about a lost student ID and a midnight deadline, and he had allowed her into the building.

As with the previous night, few students populated the library at this hour. But as soon as she entered the foyer, she caught the scent of Ben Solo. Unsurprisingly perhaps, she found him at the same desk, still equally consumed with his studies.

Rey grabbed a random book from the nearest shelf - Anne Radcliffe's _The Mystery of Uldopho_ \- and selected a desk a short distance away. Over the edge of the pages, she watched him.

For several hours, he read. Occasionally, she heard the scratch of his fountain pen against fine paper. Even from afar, she spotted the careful and cautious flexing of his wrist as he wrote, as if every word was precious.

And only once his eyes grew heavy and yawns escaped him as frequently as breaths, would he pack up and leave for his bed.

* * *

It became a ritual. Every evening, once night had swallowed the sun and emboldened the shadows of the world, Rey would observe him in the library.

This was purely an exercise in information gathering, she told herself. For how could she set the most meticulous trap for this delicious morsel without knowledge of his nocturnal habits? Every quirk, every foible she noted with the eye of a devoted scholar. How he tugged at the collar of his jumper when the building's infernal heating system blasted hot air from creaking radiators. How the first sign of fatigue was those huge hands rubbing the back of his neck, up to an hour before the first yawn.

How, on some days, his perfect natural scent was overwhelmed by the aroma of tea tree from a shower gel - perhaps these were the days he frequented the gym, for he could such a body be maintained if not through physical rigour? How, on Wednesdays, the scent of pipe tobacco would linger on his clothes - a regular appointment with his thesis supervisor, she later surmised.

How, no matter how many nights she watched him, he was always alone.

Would anyone miss him, once she had devoured him? 

That thought caused her to start. She had hunted and watched scores of humans down the centuries… when had she cared for the absence of one, once her desires had been satisfied?

* * *

As September's balminess bled into October chill, her hunger for Ben Solo began to mutate into a frenzy.

But still she hesitated.

Rey had never been a woman of inaction. Inaction would have killed her as an orphan child. Instead, she had become a cutpurse, and despite the filth and depravity of the streets, she had survived. 

Snoke's quietude had rankled with her need to _do_. Act and react. Hunt and seek rather than wait patiently.

So what was wrong with her now?

One night, sweeping through the shadows of the courtyard, she sought a brief sustenance via a booze-soaked rugby player staggering through the alleyway. 

He was a poor meal compared to that which tempted her. But it would starve off that gnawing desire - at least for tonight - until she could centre herself once more.

Unfortunately, she had not accounted for the drinking habits of the University's rugby squad.

A few minutes after her meal, when her victim lay prone and dazed, but still alive, a slow dizziness overtook her. The world seemed to move on a tilt, and noises were that little bit louder than even her heightened senses were used to.

Rey had never been inebriated as a vampire; though she had feasted on her share of drunks over the centuries, none of the lingering alcohol in her victims' bloodstreams had ever touched her before this night.

Fuck, just how much had the idiot drank? And how had he been able to walk with such poison coursing through his veins?

Perhaps inebriation made her bold. Perhaps it made her foolish.

But, even with her hunger momentarily quelled, she did not remain a silent observer to Ben Solo that night.

Shortly after her arrival in the library (via a pilfered student ID from her intoxicated victim), she watched Ben leave his desk and wander amongst the shelves. His arms grew laden with books.

Before rational thought could bleed through her actions, she found herself rising from her seat. Her boots made not a sound against the tiled floor as she crept towards him. 

His back was to her, one hand lingering over a leather tome still on the shelf.

Rey let her glamour fall away. "Are you going to leave some books for the rest of us?" She whispered loudly, with mock exasperation.

The books tumbled from his arms with a dull clatter against the tiles. And that delectable blood flooded his cheeks once more.

He mumbled an apology, and bent down to scoop up the books. His voice was deeper, smokier than she had imagined.

And she felt her gut twist in pleasure. 

What measure of sense she had left stopped her from pouncing upon him, sinking her fangs into the cords of his neck and tasting him.

Instead, she joined him on the floor to help him gather up the books.

A sly smile curled at her lips. She kept them closed, lest her fangs be revealed along with her ultimate intentions… she snatched one smaller volume from his hand. 

"I'll take that," she said, and delighted in the frown that furrowed his features. "You aren't the only Coleridge fan, you know…"

"You know that there are probably a dozen copies of that book here," he groused, although made no move to take the book from her.

More the pity, she thought, as she would have relished a fight with him. His irritation hung in the air. She could almost taste an undercurrent of arrogance and darkness in his blood…

"Well," Rey said, holding the volume out to him, "I could be persuaded to return it, for a small price…"

That furrow filled his brow again; the poor naive fool slowly realising that perhaps she was flirting with him. 

And that only inflamed her more…

"Oh? And what price does the lady ask?"

" _Mary mother, save me now!"_ She whispered. " _(Said Christabel) And who art thou?_ "

A chuckle reverberated in his chest, before his eyes darted frantically around as if seeking some scolding librarian, ready to reprimand him for disturbing the silence.

"My sire is of a noble line; and my name is Geraldine," he whispered in response, his gaze alight with mirth.

Now it was her turn to laugh. She held out a hand. "Rey."

The first touch of his skin against hers was electric. It was the universe. It was a freefall, a collision.

It was the prelude to his death, and her greatest pleasure.

"Ben," he said with a firm handshake. That flush still painted his cheeks, but a heat of a different kind filled him. "Can I have the book back now?"

Rey held out the volume temptingly, before snatching it back with a sadistic grin. "You haven't paid the price, Ben," she said with a wink.

"Oh?" Amusement battled annoyance, but his lips too curled into a smile. 

Rey nodded, and bit her lip. Playing the coquette was not in her nature, but she would play along. " _What my frenzied heart carved in utter yearning, Whom its wild desire would persuade to passion_?"

"Ode to Aphrodite?" He murmured.

"Good knowledge. How about another one? _The moon and the Pleiades have set, it is midnight, and the time is passing, but I sleep alone."_

"Good taste," he countered. "That's one of my favourite pieces of poetry. But I am yet to hear a toll from you?"

"A woman quotes love poetry to you, and yet you cannot surmise her intent?"

She heard the hitch in his breath, the unconscious swallow. His heart beat in an unsteady tattoo, as if to tease her all the more.

"I don't-" he began, running a hand through his hair. "I'm not… forgive me, Rey, but I'm not normally in the habit of- ah, fuck."

"Oh Ben," she cooed. There was no glamour nor persuasion in her voice. She had no need of it, for his eyes betrayed his desires. "Perhaps not yet… but is a kiss not a fair trade for a book?"

He nodded again, swallowed. And then his eyes fluttered closed and he leaned close to brush his lips to hers.

The caress was delicate as a butterfly's wing. Rey had to quench the desire to sink her fangs into his lips, taste that delicious blood so tantalisingly close…

Instead, she grabbed the lapels of his blazer, and deepened the kiss with eager mouth and tongue. His kiss tasted of mint, of stale coffee, and a thousand suppressed desires.

Oh yes… soon, she would feast upon him…

But not tonight.

Ben was the one to break the kiss when his lungs burned for air. Harsh pants escaped him, and his eyes grew glazed. One hand had wound its way into her hair, cradling her head.

"I don't normally do this," he whispered. 

And the blush still filling his cheeks drove Rey _wild_.

* * *

"I don't - _ah!_ \- normally do this," he said on a ragged moan, his enormous body slumped against the shelf whilst Rey tugged at the zipper of his ink-stained trousers and palmed his still covered erection. 

She slipped her hand beneath the waistband. His cock pulsed at her touch. So much blood, so close… Her control was a frayed thread, so close to snapping…

As she pulled him free, and regarded his erection with ravenous eyes, she felt a frisson of nervousness from him. "What if we get caught?"

Rey merely winked. "Then you had best be quiet…" And she leaned forward to seal her lips to the tip of his cock.

Ben's hiss of pleasure was muffled by his hand. The illicit thrill of a beautiful stranger fucking him with her mouth here, in this sacred temple of knowledge, was more erotic to him than his sensibilities would acknowledge. Perhaps he had fantasised about this? 

Or perhaps he was merely as lust-crazed as the rest of his sex, albeit more discreet in his passions?

None of that mattered in that moment. For Ben Solo was _hers._

She caressed his beautiful cock with eager lips and tongue, tugging him closer to take more of his length. Smug satisfaction filled her at sight of the moles upon his length - ones that few others had ever seen.

His cock throbbed with her ministrations. How simple it would be to unsheath her fangs and just _bite_. She could drain him of every precious drop of blood whilst sucking him off. And the poor fool would be too lost to his ecstasy to realise until he was already half-dead… he would exhale his final breaths in an orgasmic moan.

Ah, what a blissful way to expire…

But Rey did not intend to kill him that night. Oh no, she intended to fully savour him before the end…

Barely had the thought left her before his seed filled her mouth, and she felt his cock soften beneath her lips.

"Ah, fuck…" he said, too loud. Mingled awe and mortification played upon his face.

Rey swallowed his seed with a gulp. One flavour tasted, but not the one she truly desired…

She rose from her knees as he awkwardly tucked himself away. Her fingers cupped his jaw, and she pulled his lips to hers in a bruising kiss.

"My turn next…" she purred, and gripped his hand to lead him into the night...


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Part 2 is now up!
> 
> Please mind the additional tags...

By the time Rey had led him into the coolness of the night (having detoured to gather his satchel and belongings from his desk - even in the afterglow of an illicit oral sex session, he retained enough sense to remember them), she sensed a creeping hesitance and even regret coming from Ben Solo.

The courtyard was deserted. Behind wispy clouds, a full moon hung proudly in the sky. In the stillness, Ben’s heart pounded like thunder. 

She had dragged him halfway across the grass when he suddenly froze. Though his hand, still so warm and clammy, remained in her grasp, the rest of his body was rigid as marble.

"Ben?" 

The sound of his name seemed to rouse him. He ran a hand roughly through his already tousled hair, but did not meet her eyes. 

"We shouldn't have done that," he said flatly. "If we had been caught…"

She grasps his chin, and forces him to look at her. "But we weren't."

"But we _could_ have been."

"You regret it?" Rey asked. Her disequilibruim had receded, and she was starting to question the sanity of her earlier actions, even as his taste still lingered on her tongue… but she had desired him since that first night, and if she could not drink his blood tonight, she would at least let him fuck her senseless if he was willing.

When his answer was not immediately forthcoming, Rey leaned closer and whispered, "Did I not make you feel good? Did you not enjoy my lips around your perfect cock?"

Ben groaned, and slammed a hand over his mouth to muffle the sound. "Rey-" 

But she saw that his pupils were blown wide, and knew he was not unaffected by her.

"I enjoyed what we did," she said, and gently clipped his ear with her teeth, careful not to use her fangs in the process. 

"So did I," Ben replied on a hitched breath. Unbidden, his free hand settled on her waist, warm even through the fabric of her dress. "It was hot as Hell. _You_ are hot as Hell." His cheeks grew heated, and she felt it radiate off him like a furnace. So very close, so delicious, and so nearly at her mercy.

" _Love is a sacrament that should be taken kneeling_ ," she whispered, and a breathy laugh escaped him.

"Didn't exactly work out well for Oscar Wilde," he said, sliding his hand upwards to brush a hair from her face.

With sudden nervousness, he leaned close to brush his lips to hers. She let him set the pace of the kiss; despite his obvious yearning, he was still skittish enough that a more delicate approach was called for.

Already her thighs were slick with wanting. Her body sang with desire in a way it had never done for any other, be they mortal or vampire. She would not rush him, would not jeopardize his kindling desire… 

So she let him kiss her slowly, a gentle caress of lips alone. There was none of the bruising intensity, the battling tongues and sinking of teeth that she would normally favour in a kiss. After all, there would be time enough for that when she had him naked and writhing beneath her…

When he pulled away, there was a soft smile on his lips. "Thank you." He swallowed, and his next words were barely above a whisper. "I wouldn't want to presume-"

Rey placed a finger over those swollen lips that she had long dreamt of sinking her fangs into… " _My body, my senses, my mind hunger for your taste."_

He nodded, his eyes filled with wonder. "How can you even be real, and not a fantasy come to life?"

In time, Rey knew she would prove more nightmare than fantasy. But she would let him enjoy the illusion for tonight.

And she would most assuredly _enjoy_ him.

* * *

En route to his dormitory, their kisses escalated in heat until Rey felt close to combustion. She pressed Ben against the door, and plundered his mouth until he was gasping for breath. His cock, now iron hard even after their earlier endeavours, made its presence known against her dress.

They stumbled through the doorway, and even in the haze of lust, Ben motioned for her to remain silent. He fumbled with his eyes, and they stumbled into his dormitory. 

The curtains were open, and a pale slither of moonlight painted the room in a silver glow. 

He had no time to reach for the light switch before she pounced.

His satchel fell to the ground with a dull thud as he suddenly had an armful of Rey. She gripped onto his shoulders hard enough to bruise. Her legs wrapped around his waist, and writhed against his clothed erection. And as for her lips…

She attacked his mouth with every unanswered hunger within her, even as her control began to fray. She bit his lower lip hard enough to draw the merest drop of his precious blood. The action drew a deep rumble from within his chest, but he tightened his hold on her and did not cease their kiss.

The first taste of Ben Solo’s blood was a revelation. Richer and sweeter than Rey could ever have envisioned, yet with a hint of darkness bubbling within him. One drop would never be enough - she had always known that. But it was a tantalising appetizer. And in that drop, she tasted all of him. His fears, his longing, the darkness bubbling barely beneath the surface… His loneliness, his passions… 

But oh, his _fantasies…_ And how many of them, despite their brief acquaintance, concerned _her…_

In under an hour, she had transcended from virtual stranger to the woman of his dreams. Even as she fucked him with her mouth, his imagination had concocted an entire catalogue of future memories. Early mornings entwined naked in bed, sated and quoting poetry at one another. Huddled under a blanket beneath an autumnal sunset, sharing mugs of some overly sweet beverage. 

The poor fool was in danger of falling in love with her.

Rey tore her mouth from his. “Bed,” she said, her voice positively feral.

A breathy chuckle escaped him. “As my lady wishes.”

She slid down his body, and nuzzled at the very obvious tent in his trousers. That motion pulled a hiss from him, before he yanked her to her feet and began to attack her mouth once more. All of his earlier hesitation had melted away.

Without breaking their kiss, Ben walked backwards until his legs collided with the bed. Rey gave him a light shove, and he landed on the mattress. Even in the gloom of his bedroom, his pupils were dark and wide, never leaving hers as she began to unzip her dress. Her undergarments - a silky chemise and pants with stockings more fitting to the decades past than the modern era - soon followed, and she stood bare to his hungry gaze.

He drank her in, worshipped her with his eyes first. The air crackled with the heat and desire between them, and Rey knew her patience was waver thin.

But for several moments, Ben seemed content to simply marvel at her. His Adam’s apple bobbed with nervous swallows, and breaths seemed to hitch in his chest. Had Rey not been near feral in her desperation to fuck him, she might have found a certain charm in his awkwardness.

But her body was alight, craving sensation, touch, pleasure, pain… Her cunt throbbed with the need to be filled.

She stepped close, and sank into his lap, loving the feel of her bare breasts against the soft cashmere of his jumper. 

Ben's hand hovered over her hips, close enough to feel the heat, but not actually touching her. So, she ground her aching, wet cunt against his erection. A moan tore from his lips, and he threw back his head to expose that beautiful, tempting throat to her hungry gaze…

"Ben…." Rey growled, threading her fingers through his hair to tug his mouth to hers. "Don't you want to touch me? Play with my tits, fuck me with your mouth, have me scream your name as I come on your tongue?"

Again that blush… 

If she didn't fuck him soon, Rey knew her control would break. Her fangs would sink into that muscular neck, and she would not stop herself until she had drained him of every last drop.

And such a waste it would be given she had already eaten…

So, fucking it was.

Desperate hands tore the jumper from his body, tossing it to some unknown corner of the room. His plain black t-shirt soon followed.

She had caught snatches of his abdomen before, when he had stretched too far after a long night at his books. Rey knew those thick jumpers concealed a body of sheer muscle. But under the moonlight, his pale skin sparkling like marble, she saw a marvel. He could have been carved by some Renaissance sculptor.

"Perfection," she growled, before attacking his mouth once more. No teeth this time, just an intensity that rendered him breathless. She grabbed his hand, and shoved it to her breast. 

Ben groaned at the contact, and began to caress the swell gently. His fingers barely grazed her puckered nipple, and Rey thought she combust from sheer _frustration_.

So she pinned him to the mattress, hearing it creak under their combined weights. As she began to swirl and lower her hips, brushing her cunt once more over his still clothed cock, she placed a hand over the one currently teasing her breast. "Harder," she rasped. "Use your mouth too. Bite me, pinch me," she made another slow grind of her pelvis against his."Fuck me…"

Desire had robbed him of coherent speech. He merely nodded and drew one of her nipples to his lips whilst oh so gently pinching the other one. 

Every touch of his fingertips and tongue was slow, worshipful. And Rey, despite her protestations, found something almost erotic in the sheer delicacy of it all.

So lost in his ministrations, she barely noticed when he flipped their positions so that she lay spread out on the mattress for him.

Ben stood suddenly. Her body felt cold without his sweat-slicked skin pressed to hers. When had she ever cared for that?

He leaned close to her breast, resumed a slow path of worshipful kisses _. "Desire to us was like a double death; swift dying of our mingled breath; evaporation of an unknown strange perfume between us quickly in a naked room."_

His left hand snaked lower, knuckles brushing the soft skin of her thigh.

The bastard was _taunting_ her.

"If you don't hurry up and put your fingers or your mouth or even your cock in my cunt, I'll have to take care of the situation myself."

Ben's head snapped up. His eyes sought hers, as if struggling to work out the meaning behind her words… was she angry? Disappointed? Or just plain horny?

So, Rey tried a different tactic. 

In sex, she never begged. She commanded, controlled, took what she needed to enjoy herself and all of the sensual pleasures it afforded. But perhaps, if the prize was Ben Solo… she could try.

"I need you, Ben," she said, cringing at the whine in her voice. "I need to touch me. I'm _dying_ without you…"

A touch too melodramatic, perhaps, but it served it's purpose. Barely had the final word left Rey's lips when one of his long, warm fingers began to circle that nub at the apex of her thighs.

The pressure was a smidgen too gentle, so she ground her hips against his hand, rewarding him a needy mewl. 

"Tell me what you need," he rasped. " _Please._ I want to make you feel good."

"And did I make you feel _good_? When I sucked your cock, was that good?"

Ben flushed again - but the pressure of his fingers against her sex was enough to keep her other base desire for him in check. "Good? That was the most exquisite moment of my life. I want the same for you."

Rey flashed him a feral grin. "Then put your mouth on my cunt."

That vaguely scandalised look filled his eyes again, and Rey almost wanted to laugh. He had not been offended by her earlier suggestion.

He simply didn't like _that_ particular word.

But any linguistic discomfort was fleeting, for he ducked his head and pressed his mouth to her.

Rey had thought his mouth soft when they had first kissed. Feeling those pillowy lips against her cunt, that wonderful tongue caressing her slick folds with delicate, deliberate sweeps was something else altogether.

Normally, she relished the harsh mouths and sharp teeth of her kind. Nibbling, biting, drawing blood as they fucked her with their mouth. Not this reverential tenderness. But she _enjoyed_ this particular attention more than she ought to.

It would not be enough to make her climax; even when he added one and then two of his long, thick fingers, sliding them within her with increasing tempo. He moaned against her cunt as he licked and suckled, and she knew he was eager to please her.

And she _so_ wanted to come on his tongue. 

So her long-nailed fingers found her breasts, pulling and pinching at her puckered nipples hard enough to bruise.

Hard enough to _bleed_. 

The skin did not break, but the added stimulation was enough to tip her into a climax. 

" _Ben…_ "

But even as she shattered on his tongue, he continued to kiss and lap and fuck her with his fingers until she had ridden out the aftershocks.

Rey yanked at his hair and pulled that sinful mouth to hers into a blinding kiss. His arms snaked around her, and oh! How scorchingly hot his skin was against hers. Desire raged like a conflagration between them. She tasted herself on his lips, and drank from his mouth with an almost desperate thirst.

And though she had only just peaked, Rey needed _more._ There was no time for flirtatious poetry. She wanted him inside her, more than she wanted the taste of his blood. 

More than anything she had ever desired before.

He pulled away, flushed, his cock rigid and leaking as he tugged away his trousers and underwear. She watched him fumble for something in his bedside drawers, heard the rustle of foil as he tore open the condom packet and maneuvered it onto his length. It was awkward to do, half-straddling her, and he swore a few times before he got it on.

Rey wanted to tell him not to bother - neither pregnancy nor venereal disease were of concern to vampires. And she would have loved to simply _feel_ him, warm and pulsing within her. But the ensuing discussions (even without the mention of her vampirism) would have been an unnecessary distraction.

He kissed her gently, his arms trembling above her as he slicked his cock against her folds.

And then, with frustrating slowness, he began to enter her. 

She felt the pounding of his heart against her breast as he teased her with gentle, shallow thrusts. Lowering her head, she pressed her lips against the skin of his chest, and began to suck, hard enough to mark him (even transiently) as _hers_. 

Such a wondrous organ, the heart. Feeding his body with all that delicious blood. And in that moment, most of it was assuredly in his cock as he _finally_ seated himself to the hilt. It throbbed within her like a heartbeat.

Rapturous praise fell from his lips as they moved against her throat in languid kisses. About how beautiful she looked when she came. About how wet and tight and _perfect_ she felt around him. About how she couldn't possibly be real.

The entire sentiment was so painfully cliche, but it stirred something within Rey that she wasn't yet ready to examine.

"I am real," she said, clipping his ear gently with her teeth. "Very real, and-" her next words were lost on a moan as his thrusts became faster, deeper.

Ben's eyes were black with lust, his pupils consuming his beautiful brown irises. But, beneath the lust, Rey read a deeper tenderness, and what might be the beginnings of-

 _No._ She pushed away that line of thought, and lifted her hips to meet Ben, thrust for thrust. Her long nails raked across his back, and she did not cease until he yelped in pain, and his hips lost that wonderful rhythm that had her so very, very close…

A murmured apology and several druggingly slow kisses later, he resumed his ministrations.

For several long minutes, Rey felt another climax hovering just out of reach. What Ben was doing was pleasurable - far more pleasurable than fucking a mortal had any right to be - but again, she needed more.

Hooking her knees behind his broad thighs, she flipped him until she was the one on top, his cock never leaving her in the process. He looked equally mystified and delighted, an expression which melted to pure ecstasy as she rode him.

She leaned over to assault his beautiful, statuesque torso with her lips and teeth and tongue as he writhed beneath her. A change in the cadence of his breathing, the loudness of his heartbeat, told her that he was on the verge of an orgasm.

"No," she growled, one hand splayed over his heart. "Until I come on your cock, _you. Do. Not. Come._ Understood?"

Words failed Ben, but he gave a nod in between moans and hisses of pleasure.

With her free hand, Rey furiously rubbed at her cunt even as she rode him. 

"Ben…"

He followed her mere moments later, Rey still bouncing on his cock until he grew soft.

Ben looked utterly debauched. Purple bruises bloomed like flowers upon his chest, amidst the deep scratches from her nails. A blush ran the gamut from the tips of his ears, to the point where they were still joined, even now.

As his breaths and heartbeat slowed, as he lifted her effortlessly and tucked her into his chest, a deep chuckle escaped him. "I don't know about you, but that was better than Coleridge."

She hummed. "I don't know, I've never fucked Coleridge."

He laughed into her hair. Muscular arms wound themselves around her back.

For several moments, he simply looked at her. This mysterious woman he had met only hours ago, who had flirted with him using poetry, for whom he had thrown all rationale to the wind and engaged in a public sex act, whom he had fucked in his bed… 

Rey knew that look.

Ben Solo was utterly lost for her.

He kissed her again, soft and slow. And, though her suspicion of his feelings disquieted her, Rey reciprocated with oddly tender lips. For the pleasure he had torn forth from her, she would grant him the indulgence of believing this night meant something more to her than mere physical gratification.

In a voice dripping with drowsy contentment, he whispered into her hair, " _Bright star, would I were stedfast as thou art - Not in lone splendour hung aloft the night And watching, with eternal lids apart; Like nature's patient, sleepless Eremite, The moving waters at their priestlike task, Of pure ablution round earth's human shores, Or gazing on the new soft-fallen mask Of snow upon the mountains and the moors—No—yet still stedfast, still unchangeable, Pillow'd upon my fair love's ripening breast, To feel for ever its soft fall and swell, Awake for ever in a sweet unrest, Still, still to hear her tender-taken breath, And so live ever—or else swoon to death."_

And as the final words left his tongue, he fell into a deathlike sleep.

For perhaps an hour, Rey stayed nestled in his embrace. She watched shadows dance across his face from the branches outside his window. In repose, every furrow on his brow was swept away. Her fingers lightly caressed his moles, his proud nose, and those wonderful, bruised lips that had coaxed such exquisite ecstasy from her.

She eventually distenagled herself from his embrace. A snuffle that might have sounded adorable (assuming a feral, bloodthirsty demoness of the night such as herself were capable of such sentiment) escaped him, and she chuckled.

Still nude, his kisses drying on her breasts and her cunt, she padded around his room. There was little of remark. Neat piles of books upon his shelves. T-shirts folded with military precision in his drawers, and some two dozen sweaters in a dark rainbow hanging in the wardrobe. A calendar hanging on the back of the door, its boxes filled with deadlines and conferences (but no social events, she noted). Even she, three hundred years old, had a smartphone and a Google calendar. He truly was a man from a more antiquated era.

His desk was the other thing that piqued her interest. Aside from more books, and a moleskin journal filled with notes in his neat hand, there were a dozen framed photos. A child with dark hair and overly prominent ears being cuddled by a couple Rey assumed were his parents. An older Ben, dressed in graduation robes, flanked by the same couple. Ben looking uncomfortable in a tuxedo, sitting beside an elderly woman with immaculately coiffed white hair at some formal event. Beneath that frame, she spotted a letter in Ben's handwriting, promising to be home next month for Grandma Padmé's 80th birthday.

A leaden weight settled in Rey's gut. She had thought Ben to be so lonely… and perhaps he was, but he was also beloved by these faces in his photographs. An adored son and grandchild. 

And she was looking into the faces of those who would weep and mourn when she killed him.

The room grew suddenly stifling. Pain, like the sharp point of a stake, bloomed in her chest. Rey had never thought herself to have a conscience - truly, it would make existence as a vampire unbearable - but tonight, it had elected to make an inconvenient appearance.

Too intimate, too much. Victims had always been faceless and impersonal before him. She had rarely known their names, even if she had fucked them first.

Gazing at Ben Solo, still lost in sleep, she _knew_ that, no matter how delicious that small taste of his blood, she would never be able to kill him. His death would leave a scar upon the world.

Hurriedly, she dressed and made ready to leave. For a brief instant, she wondered if she ought to take some souvenir of this night of passion. But she shook the thought from her mind.

_Sentimental fool. You're becoming as bad as Snoke._

And she crept out of his room and vanished into the shadows.

Let her remain a beautiful memory for him. A masturbatory fantasy as he chased his release late at night. The passionate lover he compared all others to, and found them wanting.

In the quiet of her apartment, cold bath water lapping at her skin in the grey pre-dawn, she washed away his kisses from her cunt, and fell into an uneasy sleep.

* * *

Rey spent the next week trying to forget his taste. She gorged herself to the point of sickness on all the victims she could find. But nothing was as sweet and rich as that single drop of Ben Solo's blood.

She steadfastly avoided the library, the university, any place that students might congregate lest she unexpectedly catch his scent and lose her nerve.

The week after, she switched to sex as her drug. As she had lain on the chaise lounge in her apartment, Kaydel biting and kissing and licking at Rey's cunt, coaxing orgasm after orgasm out of her, the pleasure felt muted and grey. She and Kaydel had fucked each other on and off for the last century, and were in tune with the other's desires. It had never been anything other than earth-shattering before.

She tried to pleasure herself instead - but all she saw was Ben's eyes, filled with lust and adoration, and her arousal failed.

Her friends were quick to note Rey's unusual melancholy. Phasma took her hunting in the moors an hours' drive away. In the mists, they devoured a group of camping teenagers, and enjoyed the secondhand inebriation of the booze and drugs in their blood. Jannah and Jess dragged her to an outdoor cinema performance of _Nosferatu_ on All Hallows Eve. But whilst her friends crackled and made catty remarks about the movie's accuracy as only vampires would, Rey had found her eyes scanning the crowd for a familiar dark head and tweed blazer.

The first week of November, Rose had appeared at her door. "You need to snap out of this melancholy," she said sharply as she regarded Rey's haunted eyes and bedraggled appearance. "You're not some pining heroine from a Victorian novel. You are a proud, stoic creature of the night. The Rey I know would be horrified at what you're becoming."

Her words landed like a slap. 

Because they were true. Rey had scorned the lovesick of her kind, the brooding males who pined after virginal maidens and feared tainting them with their affections. 

What had she allowed herself to become?

A cold bath later, Rey had allowed Rose to drag her out of the apartment. They wandered the empty streets, snacked on a creepy middle-aged man who made a pass at them, and sat on a rooftop overlooking the city centre. Even in the wee hours, there was too much light pollution to see the stars.

"I've got a present for you," Rose said when the conversation reached a lull. She reached into her pink rucksack and pulled out a hardback book with a shiny cover. "Now, I know you're all sad and melancholy and conflicted about your scholar by - Beelzebub only knows why - but I figured this might give you a laugh."

Rey regarded the title and author with disdain: _The_ _Palpatine Library_ , by (the late) Professor Lor San Tekka. 

She snorted. "They finally published it, huh?" 

Rose nodded.

San Tekka had been the last of Snoke's scholars. He had taunted him from afar, fed him clues to the location of Sheev Palpatine's legendary library, and planned to make a meal of the Professor once he had found it.

But the old man had instead driven a stake through Snoke's black heart.

Rey flicked to the foreword - an effusive and frankly ludicrous biography of San Tekka, ending on the comment of how the Professor's mysterious death the following year only added to the intrigue…

Again, she snorted. There was nothing mysterious about San Tekka's demise to them. It was an open secret in their group that Phasma was responsible. Though she had held no affection of any sort for Snoke - she thought him a pathetic waste of unlife - Phasma loathed those who would harm their kind, and had efficiently dispatched of the Professor.

"If you think that's amusing," Rose said with a sinister grin, "Check out the photograph on page 69…"

A groan escaped Rey. "Oh for fuck's sake…" Emblazoned upon the page was a copy of a painting that had hung in Snoke's study - a painting of him, and of Rey seated before him. The artist had painted her with a meek, simmering expression, as if awed by the mere presence of her maker. Aside from the completely false sentiment, it bore an eerily good resemblance to her.

Long had she dreamt of slashing the damn painting, or torching it, or simply defacing it in some way as an almighty fuck you to her sire.

More annoyingly, the legend beneath the image read: "The vampire Snoke and his beloved progeny, Kira Palpatine."

At the storm in Rey's eyes, Rose positively cackled. "How does it feel to get fanon-ed!?"

Rey had never met Snoke's sire. But somehow, a fictionalised variant of her had made it's way into one of those awful Hammer Horror Palpatine movies. The character of his "grand-daughter", Kira Palpatine, also had the indignity of being killed after only a few mediocre lines (and wearing even less clothing). The movie was utter horseshit, but had somehow ended up a cult classic; and Kira had acquired herself a small fanbase too.

If she were capable of having migraines, then Rey would have pinched her brow at that moment. "Was this meant to cheer me up?" She asked Rose with an exaggerated eye roll.

Her companion cackled again. "Read the whole thing, I swear! It's hilariously bad." 

* * *

San Tekka's book did not offer Rey the distraction that Rose hoped it might. 

She spent the following night pouring over its pages, finding more references to "Kira" and growing increasingly irritated.

It gave her a savage pleasure to know that San Tekka hadn't even got the location of the titular library right.

Snoke had always lured his victims to the smaller library underneath Theed Castle. The location looked convincing enough for the legendary location, all cobwebs and sconces and borderline pornographic stone gargoyles.

The true library was much larger, and buried much deeper beneath Palpatine's lesser known hunting lodge at Varinkyno.

Of course, when she thought of the library, her mind inevitably drifted back to Ben…

Did he miss her? Had she taken on some mythological status in his thoughts, the Lenore whose loss he would mourn for the remainder of his life? Or had she simply been the pretty stranger who had given him a quick blowjob and a good fuck before vanishing into the night?

Her daily sleep was tortured by dreams of him - of another vampire catching his wonderful scent and gorging themselves on his delicious blood; of faceless men and women taking their pleasure with his body when he was hers and hers alone… Fantasies both lewd and vicious ran rampant in her mind, until she was almost delirious in her want for him.

After a few nights, Rey found herself back at the University campus. Black clouds swirled overhead, threatening a thunderstorm, and the wind would have cut a man to the bone. Such things did not bother her.

She lurked outside the dormitories, and saw a light aglow in Ben's window through a slit in the curtains. Had he elected to stay in that night because of the weather? Had he avoided the library since their encounter because it held too many painful memories for him? Or was he with someone else, filling the chasm of a lost love with meaningless passion?

A snarling, possessive beast in Rey's chest practically roared at the mere thought of him with another…

Her fingers dug into the cover of San Tekka's book, until knuckles were bone white.

Even more than jealousy, she hated that she was becoming more like Snoke than she cared to admit.

She had to wait but a few minutes in the darkness before she happened across a pale red-headed man about to enter Ben's building. He was disgustingly easy to glamour, and accepted the book from her with clear instructions to deposit it outside Ben's door.

And she vanished into the night.

* * *

The following evening, she borrowed Rose's car. Though Rey did not give a reason why she had suddenly decided to make the two hour drive to Varinkyno one November evening, Rose evidently suspected it had something to do with Ben.

"Just don't end up like Snoke. I'd miss you if you got yourself killed doing something idiotic," Rose had said, before placing a kiss upon her friend's cheek. "And don't scratch the paintwork!"

And so Rey had found herself traversing dusty corridors untouched for half a decade, alighting ancient sconces, and descending into the depths of Varykino Lodge.

This place held few fond memories. At Snoke's behest, she had spent endless hours dusting shelves and reorganizing books he would not permit her to read. (Of course she had disobeyed, and relished in the act.) 

Coming back here was madness…

No madder, she supposed, than whatever her complex feelings were for Ben Solo.

The library was as large as a cathedral; bookcases three times the height of a man, their mahogany shelves groaning with ancient tomes long lost to history. Rey lit the wall sconces, and watched shadows dance against the great stone ceiling. Cobwebs, gossamer thin, straddled between shelves.

The chaise lounge was covered in dust an inch thick, as was the desk in the centre. Rey groused at the mess. She had not returned here with the intent of becoming a drudgeon once more.

Fate, it seemed, had an ironic sense of humour.

Once she had scrubbed away a decade of dust and debris, the main receiving area looked at least presentable.

Rey arranged the bouquet of blood-red roses she had purchased en route in a vase on the desk. They had caught her eye whilst she stalked in a supermarket car park, awaiting an easy snack to sustain her for the journey. (Rose had sent her off with a pilfered unit of AB-positive - but Rey felt it never tasted quite as good as warm, fresh blood). She thought the roses strikingly pretty. More importantly, she thought Ben might appreciate the gesture.

Assuming of course, he chose to come in the first place.

Rey reclined on the chaise lounge, and waited for him.

And waited.

And waited.

By the fourth night she grew increasingly restless. Hungry, too. Rose's much derided blood unit lasted until night two before she consumed it greedily.

She paced for hours.

She slid a hand beneath her underwear, and brought herself to orgasm time and time again, remembering the sweep of his dark hair, the intensity of his eyes, the slow, worshipful caress of his tongue against her cunt, the pulsing of his cock inside her.

She tried (and failed) to distract herself with reading.

Had he even read the book? Had her note ( _Varykino is lovely this time of year - Rey)_ been too obscure? 

Did Ben simply not _want_ her? Had she concocted imagined feelings out of air, mistaken desire for something deeper?

Her parents hadn't wanted her. They had left her to die - a skinny, vulnerable child alone on the streets of Coruscant. Yet, whilst she may not have flourished in those dark years, she _had_ survived. Rejection now would not kill her. 

Even if it stung.

Finally, on the fifth night, when the rose petals were dark and withering, and the grandfather clock chimed midnight, he came.

Truthfully, she had caught his scent over the aroma dust and vellum and ancient leather some twenty minutes earlier. With every step, she heard the thundering of his heartbeat. Half ravenous, a frenzy had overtaken her. 

He had _come._ He _wanted_ her…

She had little enough time to make herself presentable. Perhaps, she mused as she wiped the grime from her face and swept her hair back into a messy bun, she ought to have put more effort into her appearance. Painted rogue upon her blood-red lips, highlighted her dark eyes in kohl, selected a wonderfully low cut and diaphenous gown that would render him a gasping, lustful mess at the mere sight of her.

Her plain black blouse and skinny jeans would have to suffice, it seemed.

When Ben Solo stumbled into the library, his hair and skin and even his blazer saturated with dust, he found her reclining on the chaise lounge, a book in her lap and her eyes dark and hungry.

He froze at the sight of her; his jaw slack and pupils blown. Lust radiated off him, and, had Rey not exercised the last of her control, she would have fucked him there on the floor before he had time to remove his blazer.

"Hello, Ben," she said, uncrossing her legs and sitting up. "Thank you for coming."

He ran a hand through his hair, as if trying to coax some sense and decorum back into himself. "This is insane," he muttered, before his eyes snapped to hers. "Why am I even here?"

"Because you chose to come. And I am glad." She almost added _I have missed you,_ but held her tongue. 

Ben seemed to register their surroundings; a different type of hunger filled his eyes. 

"You're the first human to see this place in centuries," Rey murmured. 

"I'm… flattered?" He said flatly, even as his expression betrayed his wonder. "Confused, too." 

Rey patted the fine velvet of the chaise lounge. "Come, sit with me." 

Every step was tentative, but he shuffled closer and seated himself beside her, spine ramrod straight and gaze fixed on a point somewhere beyond her ear. 

Gnawing hunger filled her gut, his scent almost overpowering with his proximity. She cleared her throat. "I expected you here days ago. What took you so long?:

"It was my grandmother's birthday," he said with a shrug. 

Of course. The grandmother from his letter and photos. The woman who gazed upon him unfiltered adoration and love. 

"I see. And did you have a… pleasant time?"

Long fingers began to worry at his hair once again. "You didn't invite me here to discuss my family or my social life. I'm not even sure this was an invitation at all, knowing what I now know about you."

Rey reached for his hand, felt the scorching heat of his skin like holding the sun in her grasp. For him, she would _burn._ She quirked an eyebrow, and tried to appear nonchalant. "Oh?"

Ben pulled his hand from hers; the loss of his warmth was like a slap. "But, in spite of all that - of knowing what you are, and what you've probably done… You're like a fever I can't shake. I was already half in love with you by the time I fell asleep with you in my arms. Finding you gone when I woke up-" his voice broke. "I searched the university for you, asked every literature and poetry tutor if they knew you. I even went on social media." The latter sounded the greatest endurance. "There were nights when I thought I had just imagined you."

Something twisted in Rey's chest. "I'm here, Ben, and I'm real."

"Are you?" He said in an accusatory tone. "Is Rey real, or just a character that you play to toy with people, _Kira_?"

She hissed. "Kira is an insulting character in a shit movie. I am, and have always been, Rey." Her voice grew soft. "And I'm sorry that I hurt you by leaving."

"You fucking _destroyed_ me," Ben said plaintively. His eyes glistened with more than just the firelight. 

"Would you rather I'd what I initially intended and devoured you? Bled you till you were naught but a husk and left your corpse to rot among your bed sheets?" Her eyes darkened.

Suddenly he was sprawled on the chaise lounge, her limbs entangled around his like vines whilst she plundered those plush, blood-filled lips and that sinful mouth that had haunted her dreams since that night…

Anger thrummed within him but he did not break their kiss until his lungs burned for air. Each breath was shallow and harsh. She watched a storm in his eyes, an emotional tumult without words, as his fingers dug into her arms, hard enough to bruise.

"You did that to me anyway," Ben rasped. "You may not have killed me, but I died all the same. I've been rotting away inside without you." His grip loosened, one hand moving up towards her face to tug her lips to his in another bruising kiss. "I've been a ghost since you left me." Those glimmering tears in his eyes spilled forth, and Rey licked them away. "Help me, please…" he said on a shuddering breath. "I'm being torn apart. I want to be free of this pain." He buried his face in her neck, brushed his lips against her skin in ghostly caresses.

"Ben…" She tugged on his hair, even as she mewled at the loss of his kisses. One hand grasped his chin, and forced him to look upon her. "You don't know what you're asking…"

Her gut chose that moment to unleash an audible protest. She felt that familiar ache of anticipation in her fangs, and cursed her weak body for its betrayals.

"My poor, poor Rey," Ben murmured, brushing warm knuckles over her pale cheek. "How very hungry you must be… Tell me, my love… when was the last time you ate?"

"Days ago," she said, the merest hint of a whine in her tone. "Don't tempt me, Ben… you won't make it out alive if you do." 

She moved to stand up, but his arms encircled her back to cage her against him. He was strong; but not as strong as her. If she so chose she could break free of his grasp without effort.

But when it came to Ben Solo, she was weak.

And so very, very hungry…

" _My body, my senses, my mind hunger for your taste."_ He whispered against her lips.

Rey's tenuous control _snapped_.

The cords of his neck offered some resistance to her teeth; but her fangs were sharp, and the bounty beneath his flesh worth the effort. His pained moan was so delightfully sinful…

And all other thoughts were driven from her mind as she drank from him. 

Had she ever tasted blood so succulent before? So delicious, so emotive, so nuanced… she devoured everything that was Ben Solo. Every memory, every dream, every fear, every desire… And every drop made her only greedier. 

She had his love - poor mortal fool. She had partaken of his body, tasted his pleasure and shared her own with him. And now, she has his life, in every metallic drop upon her tongue.

She swallowed his moans as she swallowed him. Her fingernails dug into his scalp, her aching cunt pressed against an erection that rapidly softened as he exsanguinated. 

She tasted his memories that night that had met and kissed and fucked - the exquisite pleasure, the awe, the hope. She tasted the bitterness of her abandonment, the hollowness of every endless day without her in his arms. She tasted the cold, lonely nights and the dashed dreams, the creeping insanity of unrequited love and the despondency of a bleak future without her…

...as she now faced without him.

Rey tore her fangs from his neck, blood dripping from her chin.

A drop landed on his skin - almost grey in its pallor, his flesh clammy and sweat soaked. 

What had she done?

His hand - so cold, so weak - fumbled for hers, and a weak smile played on those too pale lips. Each breath was shallow, and though his heart rate quickened, every beat was thready and laboured.

Bloodstained tears fell from Rey's eyes, each one a scar upon Ben's cold, pale skin. Her eyes snapped around the room, this wondrous library that would be his sepulchre, as if seeking guidance…

Her fangs tasted blood again - her own this time - as she tore into the skin of her wrist. Physical pain she could handle; but being without him…

She brought her ruined wrist to his lips, and felt the stickiness of her tongue as he lapped at her tainted blood.

Ben Solo closed his eyes with a final, shuddering breath…

...and the cold, bloodshot eyes which opened again regarded her with a ravenous hunger. 

Rey laughed, almost giddy with relief, before surging forward to devour his mouth. She tasted her blood, and his, a flavour more delectable than the meal she had just devoured.

Last time, he had been so good with his tongue, seducing her with tender kisses and worshiping her cunt until she shattered against his mouth. 

But he was so much better when he learned to use his new teeth… 

  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading!

**Author's Note:**

> Part 2 will be posted on 8th October.
> 
> Thanks for reading!


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